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Susie Johnson needs volunteers to save her Rainbows and Brownies

by Leah Waller

An urgent plea has been launched to save up to 50 young girls from losing their Brownie and Rainbow groups in Horsforth.

The current leaders are retiring at the end of the summer term, leaving the girls unmanned and the clubs at risk of closure.

Guide leader Jenny Shepley, 24, thinks it would be a ‘great shame’ if the groups are forced to fold.

She said: “It’s good for the young girls to experience guiding, I’ve been involved since I was five and it’s a really good place to socialise.

“The activities we do are only available within the guiding community.”

The 16th Horsforth Brownie group has been running since 1980, and looks after girls aged 7-10 while the Rainbows host 5-7 year olds.

Both current leaders, Lyn Cadmore, the Brown Owl for the Brownies, and Lynne Leeming who takes charge of the Rainbows are retiring at the end of the summer term, and after numerous appeals on social media, community noticeboards and through word of mouth their shoes are proving hard to fill.

Community champion and District Commissioner for Horsforth South Guiding, Susie Johnson, 43, from Bradford is desperately appealing for volunteers.

She thinks it would be ‘awful’ for both the guiding community and the local community if the groups had to shut down.

Mrs Johnson has contemplated taking on the girls herself, but admits it would be impossible with her schedule already jam-packed.

She leads 4th Horsforth Guides has a husband, two teenagers and an array of household pets to tend to at home, and her job as a radiographer at St James hospital in Leeds.